Hair

Ok; apologies to all other musicals, but Hair was THE great hippy musical. Of course, silly tale, but great songs.

Born in February, you know I heard this song over and over as a child:


The title song, hair, is not as good as many others. But, this is the other signature song of Hair:

Rent.

Since Dan has been writing about musicals, I had to post about Rent. I recommend watching the movie where there is a great documentary about the writer/composer Jonathan Larson who had to work for a decade to promote himself and send his stuff out there. He faced rejection after rejection and waited tables for a living, thus composing music for 8 hours a day on his days off.

Rent isn't a particularly great story, but Larson is a great composer and song writer, thus making it a great musical. Poor Larson was waiting for his positive review in the NYT and when it finally opened on Broadway, he got it, and then went home that night and died at the age of 35.

Here's a clip with Mimi singing "Out Tonight," (played by Rosario Dawson). This is Dan's favorite clip. I'm sure after watching you can see why. I want those badass boots!

She makes me want to be a stripper. So here's the clip already:

Fred Astaire's Babes

Ok, we know he's got ritz.

But, which of his main squeezes was a) hotter, and b) the better dancer?

Here is Ginger Rogers:


Ok, we all know Fred Astaire:


And here she is hoofing:





Fred's second babe was Cyd Charisse. Here she is:


And here she is hoofing:




My vote? Cyd, all the way- better looking, sexier, and better dancer.

Any questions?

More Gene Kelly And....

In my last post I may have sounded as if I disliked Gene Kelly, the dancer. No. I just disliked his films. Unlike Fred Astaire, he did not even have nice looking steady female dance partners.

But he did have partners. His most famous was Jerry Mouse, of Tom & Jerry fame, in the 1945 film Anchors Aweigh.

But, the great tv cartoon, Family Guy remade his dance scene with an even BETTER partner!

Witness side-by-side for a comparison:

Singin' In The Rain

My mom and dad loved the dance films of Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, and
the like.

I did not. These were generally mushy, brain-dead films- i.e.- the precursors of the crap that Lucas, Spielberg, and their descendants would foist upon the world decades later.

Singin' In The Rain is a particularly silly piece of fluff. Gene Kelly never excited me, although I saw these films as a child, on tv, with my parents still rapt by the aura of Classic Hollywood.

Here's the signature song and dance number:

Moulin Rouge

I mentioned this Baz Luhrmann film in my last post.

This film actually has spoken parts (as does Evita- a single line!), but they so serve the fantasy tale that there is no suspension of disbelief required, as in other musicals.

And yes, Nicole Kidman is nice to look at. I'm not sold on her as a dramatic actress (her best role was the minor role in Eyes Wide Shut- and that role is most notable for her displaying her lovely derriere; but she can actually sing quite well. And Ewan McGregor is very good, as well.

A clip:

Evita

I am not a Madonna fan, although I have always thought Antonio Banderas was an underrated actor. I am not high on musicals, yet the film version of Evita is probably the best musical ever filmed (or, at least tied with Moulin Rouge).

Why?

Simple. It totally throws itself into the artifice of a musical. There is not a single spoken word (I believe) in the whole film. The big problem with musicals is the faux idea that people in normal lives will all of a sudden break out into song.

No, does not work.

Evita does not even try, and that's a good thing. It's a non-stop roller coaster- more so than any action flick ever made.

Here's the trailer:

The Sound Of Music

My favorite all time musical, simply because it was likely the first film I ever saw on the big screen, at Radio City Music Hall, in a revival as the Twin Towers were being built.

Here is the signature moment in the film, and one in which Julie Andrews was burnished into my young retinas and mind:

The Sound of Music - Julie Andrews
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Damn, she was a babe!

Here is the trailer:

Oklahoma

This Rodgers and Hammerstein musical works better as a stage play, for the outdoorsiness of the film (clearly not Oklahoma, the state) dwarfs the supposed bigness of the music.

Shirley Jones is young and pretty but....well, that's about it. Some great tunes, but nothing else much going for it. A year or so ago I got a DVD package of the great old musicals for a great price, but have yet to watch them. This one will be interesting to see if it still ticks me off, or has it sunk even lower in my memory?

Anyway, the trailer:

Oklahoma! - Trailer
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West Side Story

Of all the street gang films out there, none has had more success than the film version of the Broadway musical West Side Story, that 20th Century updating of Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet.

I first saw it years ago, in a revival in the mid-70s. I am not big on musicals, for they succeed or fail based solely on the quality of the music. The Rodgers and Hammerstein films of the 1940s and 1960s, while having good music, were boring as shit. This film, while overrated, is still pretty enjoyable, with music and lyrics by Leonard Bersnstein and Stephen Sondheim.

Here is a clip of America:


And here is the ballad Somewhere:


Natalie Wood was terribly miscast, and her voice had to be dubbed. Rita Moreno steals every scene she's in, and there's really no male actor that is memorable, but, the songs are very good. What more should one expect from a musical?

Tommy

Not big on musicals, and rock musicals are notoriously bad.

Yes, there were the hippy plays cum films, but the ultimate fictive rock film is The Who's Tommy.

A clip below:

The Sound Of Music

I've never been a musical fan, but it was either The Sound Of Music or You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown, which was the first movie I ever saw on a big screen. The Ten Commandments may have been #1 ever (on tv, for Easter).

Either way, I saw both at Radio City Music Hall, and the sight of Julie Andrews' face so huge, pretty, and letting out such lovely sound, has always stuck with me. Aside from It's A Wonderful Life, this is the ultimate holiday film.

Herein some lyrics:



Herein the scene of Andrews, at the start of the trailer; now imagine you are about 3 or 4, at the 5th Anniversary re-release, and seeing this 40 feet high, in surround sound:



Good stuff.